Nature or Nurture
by autonoe 1
Summary: Take a murdered mutant, a skeleton or two from Adam's deep closet, and a farm full of child assassins; stir and add a dash of B/E for spice. Serve hot or cold.
1. Opening Gambit

Hey, all. Let me know what you think. No, really, I mean it.  
  
Disclaimer: Not mine, wish they were.  
  
******** NATURE OR NURTURE: Opening Gambit  
  
Bleep. Bleep. Bleep. Bleep. Bleepbleepbleepblee-  
  
A slender hand flew out of the bed and delivered a deadly blow to the Felix the Cat alarm clock's snooze button. Emma deLauro awoke as she always did, with a cranky little groan. Good mornings were for movie stars who slept in full makeup and masochistic early birds like Shalimar and Jesse. For a moment, she let herself luxuriate in the last traces of her dream.  
  
Brennan's taut, muscular body sliding over hers, skin against skin. His lips trailing slowly down...  
  
Bleep. Bl-  
  
This time, Emma sent poor Felix crashing to the floor. She forced herself to open her eyes, sit up and swing both long legs out of bed. Hissing as her feet hit the cold floor, Emma made her way to the bathroom. She caught sight of herself in the mirror and couldn't help but chuckle. Large sections of her red hair had wound themselves into cowlicks at some point during the night, and her normally pale face appeared almost ghostly in the harsh glare of the bathroom light. "I look like a banshee," she muttered. Throwing her reflection a half-smile, Emma stripped off her lucky t-shirt and stepped into the shower.  
  
Fifteen minutes later, wearing only a pair of her favorite "days of the week" panties, she stood before her closet, pondering the age-old question of what to wear. Hmm, perhaps black? Or ... black?  
  
Since joining Mutant X over a year ago, Emma's wardrobe had become a sea of dark colors (mostly black), because, as Shalimar once joked, "Bloodstains are easier to hide on dark fabrics." Feeling defiant, Emma selected a fire engine red top with a halter neck and a cream-colored linen skirt. Bloodstains be damned.  
  
As she was wriggling into her shirt, an achingly familiar face popped onto her video screen. "Hey, Em, I-Jesus Christ woman! Put some clothes on!"  
  
Blushing furiously, Emma yanked the top down over her chest. "Did you want something, Brennan?"  
  
A lecherous smile was his only response.  
  
Emma rolled her eyes. It was bad enough she was practically crippled with lust for the man-did he have to encourage it? After fastening the halter collar, she snatched the skirt off the hanger and slid into it. Finally decent, she looked back at the screen. "Yes, Brennan?"  
  
"Well, before you distracted me, I was going to let you know that Adam wants us all in his office. Now."  
  
Emma heaved a sigh. There went her laid-back morning. "I'll be down in a sec. At least tell me you made coffee."  
  
"No such luck. And Em?"  
  
"Yes, Bren?"  
  
"Isn't it Wednesday?" The screen flicked off, leaving a blank wall.  
  
What the...? Then she remembered. Emblazoned in red glitter across her butt was the word "Saturday."  
  
********  
  
Emma strode into the office, an apple in one hand and a scalding cup of coffee in the other. Shalimar, Jesse, Brennan, and Adam were all gathered around a computer screen that showed a series of bio readouts. All of her teammates were disturbed by whatever they were discussing, Adam most of all. His worry bombarded Emma's mind, rolling over her in waves.  
  
Adam was speaking. "... And the sample taken from the murder scene clearly revealed mutated DNA from three different people."  
  
Jesse examined the readout, his sharp eyes missing nothing. "Blood from all three was found in the apartment?"  
  
"Yes, but it's not conclusive." Adam hesitated. He appeared to want to say something more, yet Emma sensed ... fear? Then he noticed her presence. "Emma, glad you could join us. I want your take on this."  
  
He turned to another computer and called up another report. "Last night, a young mutant named Lily Cross was found in an alley with her throat slashed."  
  
"Slashed? Adam, she was nearly decapitated," said Shalimar. She handed a photo to Emma.  
  
Emma looked at the picture and stifled a gasp. A woman lay sprawled in a small pool of blood, curled in the fetal position. Her head lolled grotesquely to one side, revealing a wide, arcing wound in her throat. Emma guessed that her hair was blond. It was hard to tell, as it was soaked with red. Tearing her eyes away from the gaping hole in the woman's neck, Emma examined the rest of the woman's body. "She's missing a ring." Emma laid the picture on the table and pointed at break in the tan on the woman's right index finger.  
  
"Looks like it didn't come off easy, either," Brennan commented. "See the scrapes on her knuckle?"  
  
"No one found the ring in the apartment?" asked Jesse, his eyes shifting between the photo and bio readouts.  
  
Adam shook his head. "No, nothing." He glanced at the photo again, his expression shuttered. "I knew Lily Cross from my time at Genomex. She possessed the rare talent for thermal manipulation, both internally and externally. She could lower her body temperature down to sub-zero or raise it to levels that would kill anyone else. She could project her ability to any room she occupied. It took tremendous concentration and stamina, but, from an early age, Lily was very good at what she did."  
  
Whatever inner demons had been bothering Adam before were positively eating at him now. Emma clenched her hands around the desktop, determined to see where this whole thing was going before she began to ask questions.  
  
"Lily was working for a government weapons' program code-named Icarus. She, along with several other recruits furnished by the good folks at Genomex, worked to create a series of long-range weapons capable of wreaking small-scale havoc-just enough damage to de-stabilize a government."  
  
His dark brows drawn together in a fierce frown, Brennan nodded toward the photo of the murdered woman. "So, she could have been killed to keep from leaking to the public about this. Or she could have been murdered by any victim of the weapons she created."  
  
"Or," added Jesse, "she could have been killed by the father of her child. She was pregnant." He pointed at a small indicator on the screen that was clearly blinking positive.  
  
Adam's head whipped around to scan the bio readout. Again, Emma caught surges of very un-Adamlike sentiments. Shock. Self-deprecation. Fear. Even desperation. The rest of the team watched him carefully. Even they knew that Adam would normally never, ever overlook something so obvious.  
  
Emma took a sip of coffee to steady herself, regretting it at once. The coffee was tepid, and all of the sugar had sunk to the bottom. She needed a refill. And she needed to get the hell out of the office before Adam's growing panic overwhelmed her mind. Before she could open her mouth to propose a plan of action, Brennan chimed in, "Why don't Shal and I go take a look at Lily's apartment? Jesse and Emma can go to the police station and see what evidence they've got on the murder."  
  
For once, Emma was too distracted to be annoyed when Brennan partnered himself with Shalimar. She needed to get away from Adam. Besides, taking Brennan to a police station was always a fifty-fifty proposition; he hated cops with a passion.  
  
Adam was still staring at the bio readouts. "Sure. Fine."  
  
As the team filtered into the hall outside the office, Shalimar looked at Emma, her brown eyes full of questions. After the door slid shut, she asked, "So, what's up with Adam? He was as jittery as a girl on prom night."  
  
Emma shrugged. "I don't know. He was uncomfortable talking about Lily, but he really didn't want to talk about the Icarus Project." She took a bite of apple. "More precisely, his anxiety spiked when he mentioned Genomex's involvement with Icarus."  
  
"Christ, even I could have told you that. As I said, the man was just plain jittery." Shalimar looped her arm through Emma's and started walking toward the hangar. "Don't worry too much about it, Em." She glanced at Emma's outfit. "Nice skirt. Hope you don't plan on keeping it white."  
  
Shalimar was, of course, in her usual "business" attire, namely leather pants, a camouflage crop top and pair of boots with heels so high that they made Emma's feet ache with sympathy pains. "You know me: a slave to fashion. Though I swear, one of these days, I'm going to chuck it all and just roll out of here in sweats and a hoodie."  
  
Behind them, Brennan laughed. "Yeah, and on that momentous day, Jesse and I will celebrate your liberation from fashion bondage by streaking Sanctuary. Not going to happen, sweetheart."  
  
"Anything's possible, Bren," Emma threw back, giving Brennan and Jesse a mocking once over. "Especially if I'd get to see both of your cute butts sprinting through Adam's office."  
  
They were at the Double Helix. As he watched Emma settle into her seat in the back, Brennan's dark eyes narrowed threateningly. "Fair's fair, I suppose. After all, I've already seen your goods once today..."  
  
Seeing the flush creeping up Emma's fair skin, Brennan's glower melted in a knee-weakening smile. Shalimar gave an amused snort. Jesse just shook his head in disgust, strapped himself into his seat and fired up the engine. It was going to be a long day. 


	2. Paper Trail

Thanks to those who submitted reviews of the first chapter. I really appreciate (read: maniacally check for) any responses. I do have some idea where this is going, but if you have any odd requests, let me know.  
  
Disclaimer: Still not mine-with the exception of all the unfortunate souls working for Project Icarus.  
  
******** NATURE OR NURTURE: PAPER TRAIL  
  
Brennan and Shalimar walked up to Lily Cross's apartment building, which was pleasantly situated in a faceless, middle-class section of the city. From the playground across the street came the gleeful shrieks of happy children. Nothing at all seemed out of the ordinary.  
  
With a quick zap, Brennan let them into the building. It was silent as a tomb. "Just your average Wednesday afternoon," he muttered under his breath. "Pay no attention to the body stashed in the alley."  
  
Shal threw him a warning glare. They proceeded up the elevator to Lily's apartment, unit 509. The door was no problem for Brennan, and in seconds, the pair dipped under the police tape and into the apartment.  
  
The first thing Brennan noticed was the marked lack of anything personal. There were no photos, no posters, no knick-knacks. Nothing but a spartan arrangement of Ikea furniture in pale wood finish. White curtains, stainless steel kitchen. Everything neat as a pin. It gave him the creeps.  
  
"It looks like no one even lived here," said Shalimar, taking in the plain white sofa and empty coffee table. "Like a shell."  
  
Brennan walked into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator, revealing ... nothing. Two bottles of mineral water and an apple. "Even Adam would find this place too minimalist."  
  
Shalimar walked into the bedroom, and then called out, "Um, Bren, if you think the rest of the apartment was scary, you should see this."  
  
Lily's bedroom housed nothing but a floor lamp and a bare twin mattress. Brennan didn't get it-where had the three blood samples come from? The whole place was sterile as an operating room. Meanwhile, Shalimar had gone stiff next to him. She looked past him, at the door. "Did you hear that?"  
  
Immediately, Brennan fell into fighting stance.  
  
Shal rolled her eyes. "No, not people." She walked over to the door and began prodding at it. After a few seconds, she popped open a tiny compartment at the base of the paneling. A small sheaf of letters spilled out onto the floor. "Bingo," she breathed.  
  
Leaning down, Brennan snagged on of the letters and opened it. It read:  
  
Dear Lily,  
  
I spent this morning watching a group of mothers sobbing into the rubble that used to be their children's school. I didn't sympathize with their pain. I didn't think about them sifting through the dust and finding their son's toe or daughter's arm. All I could think of was McKay's smiling face when I gave my report.  
  
I cannot go on like this. You and Tyler know what I do, how I live. So you will understand when I tell you that I have to put a stop this meaningless existence. I trust you to keep silent, but Tyler is another matter altogether. I hope that you can convince him to let it go, to let me go. Maybe it would just be easier to tell him I'm dead.  
  
Give my love to the baby, when it comes. Keep it as far away from people like me as possible. And keep it away from McKay. You know what he'll do to it.  
  
Stay safe. Stay alive.  
  
Seth  
  
"Holy shit, Bren," murmured Shalimar, who had read the letter over his shoulder. "What were these people doing?"  
  
"I think it was exactly what Adam said. De-stabilizing governments. Special ops." And if Emma was right-and she always was-Adam knew more about Project Icarus than he let on. A lot more.  
  
Emma. At the mere thought of her, Brennan grinned. It would be a long time before he forgot the image of her nearly naked body, the clean lines of her back and legs. Her sleek little breasts. For the thousandth time since finding out about her powers, Brennan wondered what it would have been like if Emma wasn't an empath.  
  
But she was. And Brennan had a deep-seated aversion to emotional attachments of the romantic variety. That's why he liked Shalimar-she was drop-dead gorgeous with all of the sensibilities of a man. Flirting here and there meant nothing. They were friends, and they both understood that. But with Emma, there would be nowhere to hide. She would sense what a shallow bastard he was (if he was honest with himself, she probably already knew) and hate him for it.  
  
So he sat back and fostered an easy friendship. A stray lustful thought now and again was fine; Emma knew she was sexy as hell. She probably picked up stuff like that all the time from strangers. No harm, no foul.  
  
"Enjoying your time in dream-land, there, tiger?" Shalimar's voice cut into his thoughts, brought him back to the letter clutched in his hand. "If you're done contemplating the workings of the universe, we'd better get these back to Sanctuary."  
  
"Sorry about that," he said, slightly embarrassed. He carefully tucked the bundle of letters inside his leather jacket.  
  
"No problem." She tossed her long blond hair and eyed him thoughtfully. "We'll just pretend that you were working on a scene for your novel."  
  
They walked out of the apartment, pausing only for a second as Brennan re- latched the door.  
  
Neither one of them heard the man slither silently out of the crawl space above Lily's empty closet. Neither could have seen the rage that streaked across his dark features when he saw that they had found the letters.  
  
********  
  
Emma's smile had long since faded from a perky grin into a forced half- grimace. Thank God she could make sure people still thought they saw a happy Emma. She was currently spending minute thirty-seven in the company of one Officer Miles Halston, a rotund desk sergeant with mild halitosis and a severe lisp.  
  
Where was central casting when you needed them?  
  
"Tho, I told Mrth. Walterth that we wouldn't be able to rethcue Mittenth until the Fire Department thowed up with their thpethial equipment. But, thee inthithted that I help Mittenth then and there ..." Officer Halston paused to peer at Emma's chest, running his hand absently through his thinning brown hair.  
  
Whatever Jesse had found in the police records had better be good, because anything less would probably send Emma over the edge. She toyed with the idea of projecting an image of herself seated across from the pudgy cop and getting a glass of water, but it wouldn't be wise to leave him chattering away to himself should anyone walk into the room.  
  
"Then Mittenth actually fell out of the tree onto the rothe buth-"  
  
Emma actually felt herself loosing IQ points. The man was practically speaking a foreign language. His emotions, however, were crystal clear. The little man was stewing in his own hormones. Emma was afraid he was going to try to touch her leg.  
  
And then she would be forced to hurt him.  
  
Under her disbelieving gaze, a fleshy little hand crawled across the couch the occupied toward her still-pristine skirt. Emma glared at it and projected intense itchiness. She watched with mild satisfaction as Officer Halston snatched his hand back and began scratching furiously. Heightened powers did have their benefits.  
  
Another five minutes passed before Emma sensed Jesse waiting in the hall, brimming with impatience and frustration. She quickly made Halston "remember" something urgent awaiting him at his desk and walked out the door.  
  
"Tell me that you found something good, Jesse, because after that-" She broke off and gazed at the door with loathing.  
  
"You won't believe what I found. But let's get out of here before we discuss anything."  
  
Once they were safely away from the police station, Jesse began to tell Emma what he'd discovered. "Apparently, they don't know anything about Project Icarus. As far the police are concerned, Lily was a government contracted computer programmer with a bad case of paranoid delusion. Two weeks before she was found dead, Lily hired a professional bodyguard named Harrison van Dorn to accompany her everywhere. She purchased three guns in the past month, two of which were found on her body in the alley. The third is still missing, but obviously, it's not the murder weapon. The file also mentioned one boyfriend, a man named Tyler Verlaine. Three guesses what Tyler does for a living?"  
  
Emma quirked an eyebrow. "Computer programmer?"  
  
"Gold star for you, Ms. deLauro. Conveniently, there was no current address for Verlaine." Jesse took a breath. "It turns out there was a witness in the alley. She didn't actually see the murder, but she saw a tall, dark-haired man walking away from the scene. This is the sketch the police have of him." Jesse handed her a computer printout.  
  
Emma looked down and felt the bottom drop out of her stomach. She would have known that face anywhere-it was the face that haunted her dreams. It wasn't possible ... 


	3. Fragmented

Sorry to string this out, but I couldn't resist. As always, let me know if you approve.  
  
Disclaimer: The members of Mutant X aren't mine, but I promise not to bruise them up too much before I'm done.  
  
********  
  
NATURE OR NURTURE: Fragmented  
  
Back at Sanctuary, Brennan found himself mesmerized by the printout Jesse brought back from the police station. That face ... In his many "interactions" with the boys in blue, he'd never run into anything that disturbed him quite so much. The familiar dark eyes and scruffy five- o'clock shadow made skin crawl.  
  
"This is a joke, right?"  
  
Next to him, Emma was poring over the letters. She shot him an exasperated look. "I know I've got a sick sense of humor, Bren, but I don't think that any of us are that twisted."  
  
"Then where the hell did the cops get this?"  
  
Jesse shook his head. "From a bag lady named Marion Sturges. She said that he had blood on his hands. And no, before you ask, I couldn't find any link between her and Genomex or any of our other 'friends'."  
  
Shalimar sat across the room, paging through Jesse's notes. "Well, we might not have any idea where our mystery man came from, but, I think it's safe to say that the Tyler in Lily's letters and Tyler Verlaine are one and the same. Do we have anything at all on McKay? Or Seth?"  
  
"McKay is General Arthur McKay, head of Icarus. Not a shock. But we don't have anything on a Seth." Jesse looked up from the computer where he was working. "McKay worked in Vietnam on Project Phoenix, running covert operations in Laos and Cambodia. He was a spook. Heavily decorated, quickly promoted. Whatever he was doing, it must have been something extraordinary. Usually the government does everything in its power to distance itself from these guys. When Icarus started up in 1990, he was at the helm." Jesse turned back to the screen. "And he was one of Genomex's biggest proponents in the government."  
  
Brennan tore his eyes from the picture. "Do you think Adam knows him? It would explain a lot."  
  
"Where is our fearless leader, by the way? The man's vanished." Shalimar's voice echoed the worry each of them felt.  
  
Adam disappeared all the time. He was probably pumping someone for information about the murder. Brennan was staring into the familiar face of the composite when Emma sat bolt upright next to him. The motion caused her right thigh to slide along his, sending shivers through his lower body. He glanced at Emma out of the corner of his eye. She appeared totally unaffected. Her red hair was bundled into a twist at the nape of her neck, and wispy tendrils framed her oval face. Her blue eyes scanned the contents of one of the letters furiously.  
  
"Listen to this: 'I just got back last night. I went to see the old place. McKay has quite the new crop this year. One of the kids almost gutted me before I noticed him.' Icarus is still actively recruiting." She shuffled through the stack of papers. "There's another one here somewhere ... Got it. 'Do you ever get homesick, Lily? Sometimes, when I'm out on a job, all I can think about is sunset over the Brookfields.' Any idea where that is?"  
  
"No, but I can find out." Jesse pounded away at the keyboard.  
  
Brennan leaned over Emma's shoulder to peek at the letters. The angular black scrawl was distinctive, striking. He watched her slender fingers trace over the words, as though she could touch the writer through them. Frowning, he asked, "Are you picking something up, Em?"  
  
She shook her head as though trying to clear it, and a small wisp of silky hair fluttered against his cheek. "I don't know. I've never been able to before, but these letters almost seem to radiate pain." Paper crackled under her hands. "It feels ... different."  
  
Shalimar heaved a sigh behind them. "I'm going bonkers just sitting here, doing nothing. We should be out looking for Verlaine or McKay." She shoved away from the desk and began to stalk around the room. "What do we have? A pregnant mutant, murdered. Genomex selling kids to top-secret projects. A government-run assassin farm. And a witness who puts that man- " She threw a glance at the composite "-at the scene of the crime."  
  
An exclamation from Jesse brought the tirade to a halt. "I've got a location for the Brookfields. It's a small ridge of mountains in central Vermont."  
  
Brennan gave a disbelieving snort. "What, was the government training operatives to snowboard and make maple syrup?"  
  
"Who cares?" muttered Shal. "Is there any government property in that area?"  
  
Jesse ran a quick search. "There's a small farm outside of a place called Randolph."  
  
Shalimar smiled impishly. "Anyone feel like a field trip?"  
  
Before Brennan could open his mouth, Jesse said, "Vermont? Hell, yeah. They've got great skiing this time of year." He shot out of his seat and headed toward his room.  
  
"It's not a vacation, Jess!" called Brennan to his friend's retreating back. He turned to find Emma watching him closely. "Looks like that leaves you and me to check out Icarus. It's not skiing down a gorgeous mountainside, but it's got to be done."  
  
Emma's full lips curled up at the corners. "No loss." She leaned into Brennan, as though preparing to let him in on a secret. "Between you and me, I was never very good at hurling myself down a snow-encrusted slope. I always made it to the bottom but rarely upright."  
  
Brennan forced a smile. Being alone with Emma always made him ... uncomfortable. Perhaps it was the knowledge that there was no one else around for her to read. She would sense all of his feelings without any distractions. Even now, with Shal and Jesse on their way out, Emma probably sensed his discomfort.  
  
Confirming his thoughts, Emma grasped him by the shoulders; her small hands were surprisingly strong. He couldn't look away from her fierce blue stare. "Bren, don't worry about it. If you worry about it, you're going to make me crazy. Believe me, you don't want to see me when I'm crazy." She cocked her head and gave him a flirtatious wink. "After all Mr. Mulwray, you're hardly the first man I've been alone with." She released his shoulders with a playful shove.  
  
Brennan felt something in his chest relax. If Emma didn't care, he didn't care. His gaze fell to the printout. There were more important things to think about.  
  
********  
  
Adam watched on the screen in his private apartment as the team shared information and plotted a course for the investigation. Damn it, he should be there, helping them. Guiding them.  
  
Every time he thought of Lily's mutilated body, Adam wanted to smash something to bits. At Genomex, Lily had been the sweetest and most trusting of all the children. All of the others rallied around her protectively. Now she was dead.  
  
And it was his fault.  
  
Adam buried his head in his hands and willed himself to stop shaking. He was useless, helpless. God, he hated feeling that way. Faces flitted through his mind, faces he thought he'd long-since forgotten.  
  
Ian. Elizabeth. Jacob. Nadine. Tyler. Seth.  
  
Seth. Even the thought of him was enough to paralyze Adam. He'd known about Seth's involvement ever since analyzing the blood samples from Lily's apartment, but he had no idea that Seth's mental state had deteriorated so rapidly. Once Brennan and Shalimar mentioned contents of the letters, not a single trace of doubt remained in Adam's mind. Seth had murdered Lily and left her body in the alley.  
  
And, after that, Seth was going to fulfill the only promise he'd ever made to Adam. Seth was going to kill him, too. Even if he had to murder his way through Mutant X to keep his promise. 


	4. Walking in Circles

Author's note: I hope that this part isn't overdone. And I apologize for any confusion about the last chapter, but, as it was from Brennan's perspective, there was no way to gently interject why she reacted so strongly to the composite. Plus, I enjoyed stringing it along for as long as I could. Let me know if you like it.  
  
Disclaimer: Still not mine, with the exception of Tyler, Seth, and the murdering kids.  
  
********  
  
NATURE OR NURTURE: Walking in Circles  
  
Shalimar shivered in the crisp afternoon air. Her breath came out in little misty trails, white against the stark blue of the sky. Next to her, Jesse shoved his hands further into his pockets. The farm - to which the locals had been more than happy to direct them - was situated a good ten miles from the center of town down an unplowed dirt road.  
  
Perhaps the word "town" was a bit generous for the sleepy hamlet of Randolph. It did have a gas station and a McDonald's, as well as a pitiful excuse for a Technical College, but that was about it. The rest of Randolph was a cluster of twenty houses and a tiny elementary school. Though she never would have admitted it, Shalimar found the place kind of charming.  
  
After looking at the steep, narrow drive leading onto the property, she and Jesse had decided to leave their rental car by the road and make their way on foot to the farm. As Shalimar slogged through snow drifts two feet deep, she wondered if they'd made the right choice. The property itself was mostly wooded, dotted with small fields. It shifted steadily uphill, higher onto the hillside.  
  
"What kind of sick freak puts a dairy farm on a mountain?" mumbled Jesse. Despite his earlier enthusiasm for the trip, he seemed uninspired by their slow progress through the powdery, slippery snow. Doubtless he'd rather be skiing down it than inching up it.  
  
"I don't know, but it is beautiful. He might be an evil government-trained assassin, but Seth has a definite eye for aesthetics."  
  
Jesse muttered something nasty under his breath. Shalimar's sensitive ears picked it up, and she laughed out loud. He really was a sweetheart. He was so gratifyingly straightforward despite all of the strangeness in his life.  
  
Brennan, by comparison, was a seething mass of Machiavellian contradictions. Charming one second, aloof the next, he was always playing some sort of game. Part of Shalimar was intrigued by his deceptive candor. She knew that, given the choice, Brennan kept his secrets to himself. It was enough to catch any woman's attention.  
  
And the package wasn't exactly a turn-off either.  
  
They stepped into a clearing and saw the farmhouse for the first time. It was a large, white structure with a series of attached outbuildings extending to one side. Shalimar could smell the wood smoke trailing from the chimney.  
  
Shalimar caught the soft crunch of feet on snow somewhere to the left. Acting on pure instinct, she dove at Jesse, sending them both tumbling to the ground an instant before a blast of raw heat shot out of the trees at them .  
  
"You okay?" she whispered to Jesse as they crouched behind a snowdrift.  
  
"Yeah. How many are there?"  
  
Shal's eyes went gold as she scanned the horizon. "There are at least three, probably more." Something was odd about the figures hiding among the trees. "Jess, I think they're kids."  
  
"Damn."  
  
She heard more rustling. Childish voices. Then a small, snarling figure pounced on her. A Feral.  
  
Eyes blazing, Shal wrestled the boy to the ground. He couldn't have been a day over thirteen, but he fought like a pro. He twisted around her and lashed out with his leg, catching her in the gut. Loosing all patience, she grabbed his ankle and pulled, up-ending the boy. He jack-knifed up and delivered a wicked blow to her windpipe.  
  
Jesse, meanwhile, was having problems of his own. A cherub-faced little girl in pigtails and a Hello Kitty parka perched on the rim of the drift, her rosy-cheeked face fierce with concentration. She blasted away at Jesse with rays of heat from her bare hands. Jesse phased out, but it was clear that the intense heat was interfering with his powers. Beneath his feet, snow melted into a slick puddle.  
  
With the boy in a headlock, Shalimar kicked the girl's legs out from under her, sending her sprawling. Immediately, Jesse phased back to normal and launched himself at her. Trapped in Shalimar's arms, the boy fought like a wild thing.  
  
"Look kid, I don't -" A small fist caught her jaw. Shal flexed her jaw and tightened her grip. "I don't want to hurt you, but I will," she snarled softly. She could hear Jesse grappling with the girl a few feet away.  
  
"You're gonna pay for this!" hissed the boy. "You'll see; Tyler's gonna make both of you wish you were dead."  
  
Shalimar gave up trying to reason with him. She pressed just hard enough on his windpipe to render him unconscious. Shoving his limp body into the puddle, Shalimar vaulted nimbly over the edge of the drift to help Jesse.  
  
And froze at the sight that greeted her.  
  
Jesse lay curled on his side in the fetal position, clawing at his face, his mouth open wide in a silent scream. Something about the way he lay in the snow vividly echoed the picture of Lily Cross's bloody corpse. Above him stood a tall, wiry man with a shock of platinum blond hair and gray eyes so pale they looked white.  
  
For the briefest of seconds, he turned those hollow eyes on Shalimar, who was still thinking of Lily's body.  
  
The man - Tyler Verlaine, if Shalimar's instincts were right - went pale and began to shake. He stepped over Jesse's writhing form and approached Shal. An oppressive weight settled deeply into Shalimar's mind and began to sift ruthlessly through her thoughts and memories.  
  
Shalimar whimpered in pain and shock. The presence in her mind tightened its hold, carelessly summoning images of Shalimar's dead mother, her first crush, the first man she killed. Gasping at the overwhelming onslaught of thoughts and emotions, Shalimar struggled to breath. She felt so helpless, so invaded ... it was almost as though her mind was being raped.  
  
Again and again, the image of Lily Cross danced through Shal's mind, despite her every effort to take control of her head. Each time it resurfaced, little bolts of pain - not her own - shot through her shaking body.  
  
Desperate to keep her suddenly fragile grip on sanity, Shal wondered if this was comparable to what Emma felt all the time. She had always regarded the other woman's powers with mild disdain, preferring her own physical strength and feline reflexes. But if Emma lived with something like this constant invasion all day, every day ...  
  
Emma was stronger than she looked.  
  
It was Shalimar's last coherent thought before she collapsed in the snow.  
  
Vaguely, she registered Tyler's footsteps on the snow, his hands withdrawing something from her jacket. The printout from the police station. As darkness rushed in on her, she heard him whisper, "Seth."  
  
********  
  
With an evil grin, Emma dropped the Double Helix several hundred feet, then pulled up sharply. Next to her, Brennan's head gave a satisfying thunk as it slammed into the side of the jet. Along with mild cranial pain, Emma sensed that Brennan was regretting his decision to let her fly them to the Icarus headquarters.  
  
Of course, she had been sending a little bit of guilt his way - how was she ever going to improve her piloting if the others never let her practice?  
  
"Em, please, I'd like to live to see thirty." He sounded just like a grouchy little boy.  
  
Emma pretended to ignore him and banked a hard right, throwing his whole body toward her. Silently, she cursed the seat belt that kept him from tumbling into her lap. Brennan fumed, radiating irritation.  
  
As humor did not appear to be working to lighten Brennan's dark mood, Emma decided to give polite curiosity a try. "Want to talk about it?"  
  
"About what?"  
  
Okay, so small talk was a failure. Emma narrowed her eyes. Time to whip out the big guns. Brutal honesty. "Brennan, you can't obsess about this. We'll figure it out sooner or later."  
  
Nothing.  
  
Emma sighed. She knew what he was feeling - and she genuinely wished she didn't at this moment. When he first saw the printout, she'd felt his momentary panic. He had instantly recognized the brooding, handsome face. He stared at it every day in the mirror.  
  
Someone, somewhere had put Brennan at Lily's murder site. Emma wanted to believe that he was just being framed by one of the leftover lackeys from Genomex, but that would mean that the whole case was a set-up. But it was an awful lot of trouble to go to in order to draw Mutant X out into the open. Anyone familiar with the team would know that even a simple missing mutant would have caught their attention.  
  
And the Genomex Emma knew and loathed would never get rid of an asset as valuable as Lily Cross. The woman was not just a talented mutant; she had also been one of the foremost weapons specialists in the world. They would have just stuck her in a pod and reprogrammed her.  
  
Besides, the police had been in possession of the composite long before Mutant X became involved.  
  
It all boiled down to the same conclusion: there was no simple explanation.  
  
"We're almost to the compound. Can you land this thing or do you need me to do it?" Brennan looked eager to take over.  
  
Emma shot him a withering glance. In a series of graceful sweeps, she landed the Double Helix on a dime. She set the Double Helix into its invisible mode. "Bren, any answers we're going to find will be in that building. Hopefully."  
  
"Fine," was his terse reply.  
  
They moved cautiously from the Double Helix toward the compound. The guards patrolling the perimeter were the only outward sign that they were in the right spot. "I'll use Old Faithful to get us inside," she whispered.  
  
"The one where you project us in uniform? When did you start calling that 'Old Faithful'?"  
  
Emma gave unladylike snort. "Around the fiftieth time Shal and I used it to get into Genomex. You'd have thought they'd catch on, but it always worked."  
  
They approached the checkpoint. As predicted, Emma's trick worked like a charm. The smile she flashed at the guard didn't hurt, either. The interior of the compound was a mass of labyrinthine corridors and stairs. Every time they rounded a corner, Brennan made sure to zap the cameras.  
  
The place was almost empty. Emma easily distracted the few people who crossed their path. All of them emanated a sense of incredible stress. Something was amiss at Project Icarus. Brennan pulled her into the nearest office and, after putting the security camera out of commission, he used his powers to patch them into the Icarus mainframe. "Their system is triple encrypted. I've never seen anything quite like this. Jesse would have a field day in this place."  
  
"He'll get a chance to hack it." Emma slipped a tiny bug from her jacket pocket and slipped it onto the smooth black surface of the computer. It immediately mimicked the same color. "We don't have time to fool around with this right now. I want to find McKay's office."  
  
"Bad idea."  
  
Brennan and Emma whipped around at the unfamiliar voice. A large shape unfolded itself from the shadows. Emma felt Brennan's shock echo her own. The two men stared at each other, each momentarily lost in the experience of seeing his exact double for the first time. From their unfathomable black eyes to their well-muscled bodies, Brennan and the stranger could have been the same person.  
  
A nasty little smile crossed the intruder's face. "You have no clue what you're messing with."  
  
Blood pounded through Emma's head. From Brennan, she felt an overwhelming mix horror, shock, and aggression. But from the stranger, she could barely read anything. It was as though he had an impenetrable wall in his mind. All she could pick up were traces of rage ... and pain.  
  
Without warning, he jumped Brennan, moving almost faster than Emma could see. As the two big men fought, Emma caught a flash of yellow from the stranger's eyes. A Feral.  
  
Bren threw the man off and sent a bolt of electricity at him. With a growl, the man dodged, as elegant as a dancer. He flipped backward and then wheeled at Brennan with a powerful kick, sending Bren sprawling. The stranger was on him in an instant, his hands raised to deliver a killing blow.  
  
Adrenaline pumping, Emma launched herself onto the man's back and bombarded him with panic and fear. He gasped and his grip loosened enough for Brennan to scramble free. With both small hands pressed to his temples, Emma continued her mental attack.  
  
Then the wall guarding the man's mind dropped and Emma went rigid as an all- consuming tidal wave of emotion ripped through her. Wrath. Guilt. Pain.  
  
The pain was ... familiar. Before she could identify where she'd felt that deep, gut-wrenching pain, Brennan yanked the stunned man from her grasp and delivered a series of ferocious blows to the man's head, interspersed with severe shocks to his body.  
  
The pieces clicked in Emma's mind. "Bren," she said hoarsely, "hold on. I think ... Bren, he's Seth." 


	5. Double Take

Author's note: Thanks once again for all of the support. I apologize for being a little trite, but hey, it's fun to write. And the possibilities for angst-ridden jealousy are just too delicious to pass up. I will also be the first to admit that the plot is mildly convoluted, but I like it that way. Enjoy.  
  
Disclaimer: Well, if you've read the last chapters, you already know that I've given up any claim to the members of Mutant X. Seth, however, I will defend with the last breath in my body.  
  
********  
  
NATURE OR NURTURE: Double Take  
  
As Brennan's mind struggled to comprehend what Emma's words might mean, Seth tensed beneath him. "Is she right - are you Seth?"  
  
In response, the man began to flail wildly. Brennan sent another shock through him. "Answer the question."  
  
The man's eyes darted to Emma, who stiffened under his intense scrutiny. Her blue eyes grew to the size of saucers as something passed between them. She scooted closer and laid a hand on the man's forehead. "He's Seth," she whispered softly.  
  
Brennan dragged Seth upright, breaking Emma's contact with the man. She didn't often touch people in a fight, usually choosing to use her powers at a distance. The sight of her actually laying her hand on Seth had disturbed Brennan in a way he didn't want to examine. All he knew was that they had to get Seth back to Sanctuary and get some answers.  
  
Emma bit her full lower lip, her eyes still locked with Seth's. As though he weren't pinned to the floor by his doppelganger, stunned and immobilized, he spoke to her calmly. "My fight isn't with you, Red. You friend here - " his dark eyes flitted to Brennan " - took something that didn't belong to him."  
  
"What, the letters? If you wanted them back so damned badly, you should have asked Lily for them before you slit her throat in that alley." That brought Seth's rage-filled glare back to Brennan. Good. The less time the sick bastard spent staring at Emma, the better.  
  
With a growl, Seth tossed Brennan off of him. Brennan slammed into the wall and struggled to his feet. "Sensitive, isn't he?" he gasped.  
  
"Now is not the time, Bren," warned Emma. She rose gracefully to her feet, never once taking her eyes from the enraged Feral. A brilliant blue ball of energy shot from her forehead and slammed into Seth. He collapsed in his tracks.  
  
"Nice work." Brennan wiped at the blood trickling from the corner of his mouth. Seth had a nasty left hook.  
  
"Yeah, well, it was either that or watch you two pound the crap out if each other for the next half hour. As we've got about thirty seconds before this room is swarming with guards, I thought I'd step in." She leaned over Seth, feeling for a pulse. "He should be out long enough for you and me to get him to the Double Helix."  
  
Together, Brennan and Emma looped Seth's limp arms over their shoulders and dragged him out into the corridor. Sharp footsteps echoed just around the corner. With a glance backwards, Emma projected the image of an empty hall and a compulsion to check each and every room. Brennan thought he saw her flash an amused smile, but he couldn't be sure.  
  
Brennan's battered body protested under Seth's dead weight, his ribs throbbing. He would have died before admitting it, but he was mildly irritated at the way Emma kept pace with him. She looked as fresh and clean as she had that morning at Sanctuary, not a spot of dirt on her cream- colored skirt. Hell, she hadn't even broken a sweat. He, on the other hand, felt jarred by every step they took. His clothing was torn and bloodstained and the entire right side of his face felt swollen.  
  
Worse than his physical discomfort was the clawing uncertainty in his gut. Seeing Seth had sent his mind reeling. He knew that there were a finite number of explanations, but none of them were easy to accept. It was possible that, somehow, Genomex had had him cloned, but Seth had a long, complicated past of his own. Seth could have had plastic surgery, but that made even less sense, unless it was a very recent development. Seth could be transmorphic, but every other transmorph Brennan had known reverted to his or her true form went they were unconscious. Or Seth could be his twin.  
  
That possibility had so many repercussions that Brennan refused to think about it. He could not, would not, did not have a twin brother.  
  
They were outside of the compound's perimeter. Emma spoke a command into her ring, and the Double Helix reappeared. She and Brennan strapped Seth into one of the seats in the back of the plane. "Christ, am I that heavy?" Brennan muttered.  
  
"Couldn't say. I've never been in a position to find out."  
  
Emma would choose this moment to get flirty with him. Brennan saw the impish twinkle in her eyes and scowled. "I'm flying home."  
  
"I wasn't that bad."  
  
"Em, half of the bruises on my body are from the fight with Seth. Three guesses where the rest of them came from."  
  
She slid unhappily into the co-pilot's seat. "Chicken."  
  
"Ha! I let you fly here in the first place, didn't I?"  
  
Emma mulled that over while Brennan took off and set the Double Helix on a course for Sanctuary. Brennan was glad she kept silent; the last thing he needed right now was for Emma to start picking at his emotions. The knowledge that she already knew every little thing he was feeling rankled.  
  
Next to him, Emma turned in her seat and gazed at Seth. Brennan's fingers went white as he gripped the controls. "Is he waking up?"  
  
"No. I was just thinking ..." She faced Brennan. "Don't you think it's a little weird that he just fell into our hands?"  
  
Some of Brennan's frustration boiled over. "Not as 'weird' as the fact that the son of a bitch looks exactly like me. And don't say, 'There's a reasonable explanation for all of this,' because there's nothing reasonable about any of this."  
  
"I'm sure that Adam can - "  
  
"Save it, Emma." The second the words left his mouth, Brennan regretted them. He had no right to take his anger out on Emma. They sat in moody silence the rest of the way back to Sanctuary.  
  
********  
  
Emma rubbed her gritty eyes. She had been staring at a computer screen for the better part of two hours. After taking a blood sample from the still unconscious Seth, she'd all but ordered Brennan to take the Feral to a secure room.  
  
Emma hadn't seen Bren since - and, frankly, she didn't want to. From the moment he'd first seen Seth, his emotions had hit her like a maelstrom. Confusion, anger, fear, betrayal. The flight home in the Double Helix had been almost unbearable. Emma knew that Brennan was upset with her, with her abilities. She'd felt his discomfort around her before, but nothing like the constant resentment that pounded her in the cabin of the Double Helix.  
  
And, to make matters worse, Adam was still nowhere to be found. Overwhelmed by the need to resolve at least some of the questions surrounding Lily Cross's murder and Seth, Emma had decided to run every test she could think of on Seth's blood.  
  
As she thought, it was a match to one of the samples found in Lily's apartment. More disturbing was the fact that Seth's DNA information already existed in Adam's records. Adam had been lying to them from the beginning.  
  
Emma ran the last test with shaking hands. Seth's DNA was an exact match for Brennan's, which meant that he was either a clone or a twin. Neither possibility boded well. Brennan was not going to be happy with this bit of information.  
  
Desperate to distract herself, Emma tried to contact Shalimar and Jesse. Perhaps they'd found something in Vermont that could help explain what the hell was going on. Pressing the tiny button on her ring, Emma said, "Are you there, Shal? It's Emma." Nothing. Emma tried Jesse, only to get the same result. Not good.  
  
Shoving away from the desk, Emma went to look for Brennan. She found him sitting on the floor outside Seth's cell, still radiating anger and resentment. "Bren?" she ventured.  
  
He glared up at her, his black eyes burning. "What?"  
  
"I can't get a hold of Jesse or Shal. We've got to go after them." At her words, the sulkiness faded from Brennan's handsome face. "There's more, but I'll tell you on the way."  
  
Brennan rose to his feet. "Should one of us stay with him?" He gestured at the sealed door.  
  
"No, I can keep him under with a sedative while we're gone. But I think we should see what he knows about the farm in Randolph before we head up there."  
  
Emma reached out with her mind, feeling for any sign of consciousness in the room. She felt only the buzz of long-suppressed rage that marked Seth's presence. Nothing indicated that he was awake. Just to be sure, she opened the door and slipped into the room. Brennan had strapped him to an examination table - and none to gently, if the marks on Seth's arms were any indication.  
  
As she reached Seth's side, Emma felt Brennan step into the room. She reached out to touch Seth's forehead, marveling at his resemblance to Brennan. The instant her skin brushed against his, Seth's eyes snapped open. He gave her a weak smile.  
  
"You pack a hell of a punch, Red." She felt his amusement break through a swirl of darker emotions.  
  
Mustering all of her coaxing abilities, Emma blanketed the Feral with feelings of trust and comfort. "We need to know about the farm, Seth."  
  
Seth angled his head away from her hand. "Save it, sweetheart. Psionic manipulation doesn't work worth a damn on me."  
  
Brennan moved to stand directly behind Emma. Every nerve in her body tingled at the sudden warmth along her back. "Tell us about Vermont," he snarled.  
  
Seth's face was stony. "You'll find out on your own." His eyes met Emma's, and she would have sworn that his expression softened. "Watch your back. That place is Tyler's personal playground. And as good as you are, Red, you're no match for Tyler."  
  
"Thanks. We'll be back in a bit." Without warning, she injected a strong sedative into Seth's arm. His eyes remained locked with hers until he lost consciousness.  
  
"I'm really starting to hate that bastard," spat Brennan. He grabbed Emma's arm roughly and pulled her out of the room. "Let's go find Shal and Jesse."  
  
Through all of Bren's emotions, Emma caught an odd impression of ... protectiveness? Emma had sensed Brennan's protective instinct before - usually when Shalimar was in danger. This, however, felt darker. It danced at the edges of her mind, then slipped away as they lifted off in the Double Helix. 


	6. Standoff

Author's note: What can I say? I love melodrama.  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own Barbie, either.  
  
********  
  
NATURE OR NURTURE: Standoff  
  
The first thing Jesse noticed when he came to was the stack of Barbies. Each one was outfitted in a mismatched conglomeration of sequined ruffles that would have made Shalimar cringe.  
  
Hell, it made him cringe.  
  
The second thing he noticed was the angel-faced little girl, watching him suspiciously. Her curly blond hair was pulled back into two fat pigtails. "You shouldn't be here," she said quietly.  
  
Jesse blinked. As an only child, he had no experience with kids. They made him nervous. "I'm sorry. We didn't know."  
  
The girl frowned fiercely, revealing a dimple. "Tyler says visitors aren't 'llowed." With that cryptic remark, she turned back to her dolls.  
  
Jesse flexed his muscles experimentally. He was tied to an old lazy-boy recliner. His head pounded, an after-effect of whatever Tyler had used to incapacitate him. It was difficult to concentrate long enough to use his powers. Drawing a deep breath, Jesse tried to focus. His body phased and he leaned forward -  
  
Pain.  
  
Gasping, Jesse fell back in the chair. Whatever they had used to secure him was phase-proof. He glanced down, but the restraints looked like normal ropes.  
  
The girl was watching him again. "We're not dumb. Tyler said that you were a 'specially hard target to 'comodate." She propped a Barbie on his foot.  
  
Jesse counted to ten and tried again. "What's your name?"  
  
She was forcing a tiny hat onto one of her dolls. "Katie."  
  
"Hi, Katie. I'm Jesse."  
  
Another doll was laid at his feet. "Did you come to see Tyler? He was very mad with you. Very mad. You and your friend aren't 'posed to be here." And like that, she was ignoring him again. Humming, she began to brush one of the doll's hair. It was hard for Jesse to reconcile this little girl with the person who had attacked him so ferociously outside in the snow.  
  
"Katie, do you know where my friend is?" he asked, careful to keep his voice light.  
  
"With Tyler. Do you wan to play?" She held up a garishly made-up Barbie sporting an electric blue tube top and a full-length tiger print skirt. Her blond hair was looped into half a dozen braids, secured by a hideous array of scrunchies. "You could be Teen Sensation Earring Barbie with retractable hair." Katie whacked a button on the back of the doll, and the braids were sucked into the doll's head.  
  
"If you untie me - "  
  
She shot him a pitying look. "I told you, we're not stupid." She put the Barbie in his lap. "You'll be Natalie." Before Jesse could react, Katie deposited a male doll next to Natalie.  
  
"That's Justin." Jesse shuddered as he took in Justin's green hot pants and rainbow boa. Apparently, Justin had issues.  
  
"Now - "  
  
Under any other circumstances, Jesse would have cursed his luck when Tyler walked into the room. However, given the choice of being Natalie and Justin or duking it out with Tyler, Jesse would have gladly abandoned the dolls to Katie's dubious care.  
  
Tyler's pale eyes were frigid. Next to Jesse, Katie scrambled to her feet. "Tyler, I - "  
  
Tyler held up a hand. "Katie, go find Matthew for me." His tone was as blank as his expression. Katie threw Jesse a sympathetic glance before scampering from the room.  
  
Clearing aside the dolls, Tyler settled onto the dusty couch opposite Jesse's chair. "I've just had an interesting conversation with your friend, Shalimar. She tells me that you're here to find out whatever you can about Lily Cross and Project Icarus."  
  
Jesse had a hard time believing that the conversation between Shalimar and Tyler had been an easy one. Shal didn't take kindly to questioning in any form.  
  
"She has a formidable will. It was a shame to have to break it." Tyler's unblinking stare reminded Jesse of a snake. "You, on the other hand, are an open book." He relaxed in his seat, crossing his arms over his thin chest. "Jesse Kilmartin. Twenty-four years old. Problems with your father - typical. A bit of a crush on one of your teammates, but nothing you'd ever act on. Ahh, a member of Mutant X for two years. With Adam. Tell me, how's Dr. Kane doing these days?"  
  
With every word that came from Tyler's mouth, Jesse felt an invisible force clawing through his mind. His headache ballooned until he thought he might pass out again.  
  
"Now, now, Jesse. Focus. Tell me about Adam."  
  
Father figure. Voice of reason. Genius. Friend.  
  
Tyler gave a mirthless little laugh. "Would it bother you to learn that your precious Adam was responsible for founding Project Icarus? Under another name, of course, but he hand-picked all of us." He sighed. "He's very, very good at playing wounded martyr. He's also very good at getting what he wants from people."  
  
Jesse's mind rebelled against the foreign images bombarding his mind. Adam administering injections to children. Adam studying those same children through thick plexiglass, taking notes as he ran them through test after test. Adam leaving the children without a backward glance.  
  
"One wonders which Adam is the real one? The loving father or the uncompromising man of science; personally, I always felt that it was somewhere in between." Tyler unfolded something and laid it on Jesse's lap next to Justin and Natalie. "And this, this I find very curious."  
  
Brennan's face glared up at him from the composite sketch. Jesse looked at Tyler. The blond man had shed any trace of his earlier aloofness. Tension was visible in every line of his wiry body.  
  
"Somehow, I think Shalimar already told you who this is."  
  
Tyler smiled. "She told me who she thought it was. But I know better." Another set of images crashed into Jesse's mind. A man with Brennan's face setting fire to villages. Slashing throats. Setting explosives. Always with the same impenetrable expression. Methodical, controlled, self- confident.  
  
"That, my Elemental friend, is Seth. Trust me, you've never met. He's a hard guy to forget."  
  
********  
  
Brennan lifted the squirming boy by the scruff of his neck. "Tell me where Tyler took them."  
  
The boy snarled and lashed out, aiming for Brennan's head. Bren gave him an impatient shake. "Where are they?"  
  
Next to him, Emma fixed her blue eyes on the kid. He stiffened in abject fear as she began to read his emotions, almost like he expected it to hurt. Clearly, whatever Emma was doing to him wasn't as bad as he'd anticipated. Curiosity quickly replaced fear. After she finished, Emma gave the kid a comforting smile. Then she turned to Brennan. "They're inside - with Tyler."  
  
During their flight to Vermont, Emma had broken the news about the test results. Seth was either a clone or ... a brother. The idea made him ill.  
  
Emma was already moving toward the farmhouse. In deference to Vermont's snowy weather, she'd changed out of the skirt and pulled on a tight pair of jeans. Despite all of the other distractions clouding his mind, he had to admit that her backside looked damn good in jeans. Tucking the kid under his arm, Bren loped up the hill after Emma.  
  
The house was eerily silent. The unlocked door swung open easily, revealing the poorly lit interior of the farmhouse. Beneath his arm, the boy struggled, then fell silent, as though he'd heard something.  
  
Emma darted to the left, disappearing into another room. A small moan reached his ears. Without thinking, he plunged after her.  
  
In the corner, curled into a tiny ball, sat Shalimar. Her long blond hair was a tangled mess, her face scratched and dirty. Emma knelt next to her friend, murmuring softly. Her face was ashen. She looked up at Brennan. "Tyler's a full-fledged telepath, Bren. He knows we're here; I can feel it."  
  
"And you, my dear, are quite an empath." Brennan whirled, freezing at the sight of the lean man lounging in the doorway. Tyler went pale at the sight of Brennan. Using Tyler's shock to his advantage, Bren dropped into a crouch, unleashing a bolt of electricity at the mutant. The man flew back with a satisfying thump.  
  
The boy, released from Brennan's bruising grasp, went after Emma, his eyes flashing gold. Emma calmly hit him with a tiny ball of energy. He fell to his knees and began sobbing like a baby. Brennan looked at Emma questioningly. She gave a delicate little shrug and advanced on Tyler's prone form.  
  
Tyler's hand shot out, knocking Emma's legs out from under her. He rose, an arm wrapped threateningly around her neck. His icy eyes locked on Brennan. "You're not Seth." As accusations went, Bren could think of worse.  
  
"I told you," croaked Shalimar. She had risen to her feet, pure hatred blazing in her eyes. "Now let her go before I gut you like a fish."  
  
Tyler laughed, the sound ugly. "I don't think so. It's too much fun to play with Adam's little family." His hand caressed Emma's cheek. "An empath - how interesting, considering Adam always thought that they were worse than useless."  
  
Emma gave a helpless little cry as Tyler turned his powers on her. Her blue eyes glazed over in pain. "Just as I thought. Useless."  
  
Brennan didn't think. He just reacted. He was on Tyler in a heartbeat, wrenching the man's arms away from Emma with brute strength. No one hurt his friends and got away with it. Emma crumpled to floor in a heap. The sounds of her gasping for breath sent Brennan over the edge. He was going to pound Tyler into oblivion.  
  
Catlike, Shalimar slipped around him and grabbed Brennan's wrists. "Bren, stop. As much as I'd love to see this monster in a body bag, we need him alive. And he's not going anywhere." Sides heaving, Brennan pulled back. Tyler's body lay limp under him, blood trickling from a dozen different cuts.  
  
He rolled away from the unconscious telepath and found Emma clutching her head. Her eyes were wide with shock and fear. "Bren, Shal ..." She drew a deep breath. "I can't feel anything." 


	7. Rolling with the Punches

Author's note: I could regale you all with excuses for why this chapter took so long, but that would entail a long diatribe about the current state of politics and the economy (in a nutshell, George W. Bush). I live in D.C., so reality's been a little, shall we say, REAL lately. Instead, I apologize to my readers and swear that it won't happen again.  
  
Disclaimer: Still not mine. Although, after this long, I'm starting to feel like I've at least got partial custody. Every other weekend and Christmas.  
  
********  
  
NATURE OR NURTURE: Rolling with the Punches  
  
Emma burrowed under her blanket, utterly miserable. She'd spent the two days since the team returned from Vermont holed up in her room, alone.  
  
The minutes after Tyler had ripped away every trace of psionic ability from her mind had passed in a haze. Emma vaguely remembered the rest of the team rounding up the children - five in all. Matthew and Katie, of course, as well as a sullen shape-shifter named Pauline, a chunky kid with an uncanny knack for computers, and a seven-year-old who insisted on being called "Lord of the Deep."  
  
Emma barely recalled Brennan scooping her up and carrying her to the Double Helix. At Sanctuary, he, Jesse and Shalimar had kept concerned vigil over her the first night, until she forcibly ejected them all from her room.  
  
She had refused to see anyone since.  
  
Emma rolled over on her stomach, burying her face in her feather pillow. The loss of her powers had left her completely bereft. Unlike the times the GSA agents had used a neural inhibitor to block her powers, Emma could actually feel the empty place in her mind where her psionic abilities had been. It was as though Tyler had sliced away one of her senses.  
  
Useless. The word echoed through her mind, over and over. What good was she to anyone like this? Brennan's face rose in her mind, his eyes full of pity. Even without her powers, she had recognized the look. That was what Tyler had reduced her to - an object of pity.  
  
Something hardened in Emma's mind. She was more than her powers, more than a mutant. And she'd be damned if she let someone like Tyler dictate the terms of her life. Tyler hadn't taken away her brain, just her empathy. She could still help the team with the investigation into Lily Cross's murder. After all, with the exception of Adam, who used the lab more than Emma?  
  
Her renewed resolve banished her lethargy. Suddenly, she realized that she was famished. Emma looked up at Felix. The battered clock suspended in his belly read 2:57am. The perfect time for a snack and a little visit to the lab. Emma sat up and pulled on a pair of butterfly-print yoga pants. Without even glancing at her mirror, she slipped out of her room and walked toward the kitchen.  
  
The fridge was full of all of the food that Adam deemed healthy - fruit, vegetables, soymilk, and garden burgers. Nose crinkling in disgust, Emma slammed the door and went for Shalimar's stockpile of junk food. Usually, Emma cursed Shal's super-fast metabolism, which allowed her to eat anything she wanted and never gain an ounce. Tonight, the Twinkies and Doritos looked like manna from heaven.  
  
With a glass of milk and an entire bag of Oreos under her arm, Emma headed for the lab. There were so many questions left unanswered.  
  
Possibilities buzzing in her brain, Emma swept into the lab without bothering to switch on the lights. Stuffing an entire cookie into her mouth, she curled up catlike in one of the swivel chairs in front of the computers. She brushed the chocolate crumbs from her lips absently, intent on the work at hand.  
  
Three hours later, Emma fished blindly for an Oreo and found nothing but an empty plastic bag. Scowling she crinkled it into a ball and hurled it toward the corner of the room. After endless tests and scans, Emma was left feeling more confused than ever.  
  
One thing, however, was crystal clear. Aside from running operations that rivaled the CIA for nastiness, Project Icarus had found a way to accelerate mutation. And, if the tests Emma had run on the DNA sample from Lily's child were any indication, they had taken their experiments to an extreme that put Genomex to shame. A mere two and half months after conception, the baby tested as a fully developed mutant.  
  
A Feral.  
  
Unfortunately, that was about the only certainty that Emma had in the whole ugly mess. Thanks to Jesse's meticulous attention to detail, each of the children had a comprehensive file, complete with blood test updated every twelve hours. By cross-referencing each of the samples, Emma found that their mutations had been fluctuating ever since leaving the farm. Some samples showed readings so low that no evidence of mutation was visible at all. Twelve hours later, the same child showed levels of power comparable to that of Ashlocke.  
  
Recognizing that it would be impossible to unravel that particular knot without more information - or Adam, wherever he was - Emma had attacked the mystery of Lily's baby. She fully expected the child to be Seth's. She was wrong. Nor did it belong to Tyler; in fact, the baby's DNA didn't match anyone in Sanctuary's database.  
  
As if that weren't enough of a dead-end, all of the tests Emma had run on Seth and Brennan had yielded one, thoroughly maddening result: inconclusive.  
  
Emma unwound her body, wincing as her stiff muscles protested the sudden movement. She needed to think about what she'd found -and what she hadn't. Maybe a little meditation would help unclutter her mind.  
  
********  
  
Brennan savagely attacked the punching bag, oblivious to the sweat streaming down his torso. By all rights, he shouldn't be this tense after a three-hour marathon workout. If he were a sane man, he would be in bed recuperating from playing nanny to the pack of rabid kids that seemed hell- bent on turning Sanctuary into their own private playground.  
  
Instead, he was pounding his frustration into a poor, defenseless punching bag.  
  
With a sigh, he abandoned the bag and grabbed a towel from the stack Adam kept hidden behind a sliding panel. The stack was almost gone, yet another sign of Adam's absence. As he buried his face in the clean terrycloth, the image of Emma's pale, ravaged face flashed through his mind. Nothing would ever erase that moment from his memory.  
  
Except maybe beating Tyler to a bloody pulp. And there was no chance of that. After seeing the ferocity with which Bren and Shal shoved Tyler into his cell, Jess had taken the precaution of wiring the room so that he would be alerted any time anyone entered. Not for the first time, Brennan cursed Jesse's sense of honor.  
  
The soft hiss of the door sliding open cut into his thoughts. A familiar silhouette stood in the doorway. Brennan scrambled to his feet. Emma stepped into the room, almost hesitant. "Hey Bren," she said quietly. Her face still bore an unnatural pallor, the circles under her eyes so dark they appeared bruised. Always slender, she now seemed emaciated, and the arms wrapped protectively around her waist were painfully thin.  
  
Bren was torn between wanting to offer comfort and a sick, selfish urge to pretend that nothing at all had happened. He decided to go with bald honesty. Emma, even a wounded Emma, had a very low bullshit tolerance. "Feeling better?"  
  
He was rewarded with the ghost of a smile.  
  
"I'll live."  
  
Those two words spoke volumes. Emma was a survivor - hell, they all were. She would be okay. Something inside Brennan relaxed at the thought. "So, what brings you to the gym at this ungodly hour?"  
  
Her eyes flicked over his sweat-soaked torso and the discarded towel. "Probably the same thing you're doing - clearing my head." She sat on of the weight benches and pulled her legs to her chest like a little kid. "Actually, my first stop was the lab."  
  
"To try and fix your.?" Bren touched a hand to his forehead.  
  
Emma's browed furrowed. "No. I somehow doubt anything Adam's invented could undo what Tyler did. He didn't block my powers or switch them off. I know what that feels like. It's like he cut away the part of my brain that made me an empathy." Her shoulders slumped. "Anyway, I've been wallowing in depression for two days now. I wanted to do something to take my mind off of it. I was trying to see if I could uncover anything about Lily and Project Icarus."  
  
"And?"  
  
"The baby - which by the way, did not belong to Tyler or Seth - was already a full-fledged mutant. Every other lead I tried to investigate turned into a dead end. Even you and Seth." She gazed at him questioningly. "Have you three managed to uncover anything new in the past 48 hours?"  
  
He sank onto the bench next to her, suddenly feeling very weary. "Other than the fact that Katie likes to 'style' Shal's hair and the fact that the Lord of the Deep has a disturbing tendency to disassemble anything unlucky enough to cross his path, no."  
  
This time, Emma's smile was real. "Hey, if this gig ever falls through, you could find work as an au pair."  
  
Bren found himself returning her smile. "Laugh all you want, sweetheart. Don't think you're going to escape babysitting duty."  
  
She groaned good-naturedly, and for an instant, Tyler, her lost powers, and his confusion over Seth were all forgotten. All that was left was an unfamiliar feeling of well-being.  
  
The moment was shattered by a bitter voice. "Why, if it isn't Red and my favorite long-lost brother. Fancy meeting you here at 4 a.m." 


End file.
